This invention relates to agricultural harvesting machinery and, in particular, to an adjustable crop divider that is provided on the front end of a crop processor or header unit mounted transversely at the front of a mechanical harvester or combine. While there are many headers or crop processors for performing a variety of functions, for simplicity sake, the invention here will be discussed with reference generally to a crop header for a combine. Those skilled in the art will appreciate that the invention can be utilized with a variety of harvester and header configurations.
A crop divider is a device positioned at the front of a header unit to divide the crop into rows, consistent with the design and capacity of the header, by deflecting the stalks of the crop as the combine proceeds through the field. If, for example, the header is designed for harvesting six rows of corn simultaneously, seven crop dividers are required across the front of the header.
Typically, a crop divider has a forward facing pointed end for engaging the crop, and a rearward portion pivotally mounted to the header which permits the divider to be raised or lowered in a vertical arc in order to compensate for changing terrain contours. Typically, a manual height adjustment chain extends from the forward end of the divider to an attachment location on the header. By changing the effective length of the chain, the divider is caused to swing about its pivotal mounting to either raise or lower the front end of the divider. Manual adjustment of individual dividers, however, is a time consuming and tedious task, particularly as crop processors of greater capacity, i.e., able to process more rows of crops, are being designed. Manual adjustment of each crop divider requires the header unit to be raised and the operator to crawl under the header to raise or lower each divider individually by adjusting the chain at its point of attachment to the header.
To overcome time consuming manual adjustment, it has been proposed to use sensors to effect automatic height adjustment of the header and divider units. See, for example, U.S. Pat. No. 4,193,250. However, such arrangements are expensive, costly to maintain, and oft times unable to be repaired in the field.